The present disclosure relates to an image forming apparatus, a communication device, and an image forming system, and in particular, to a technique to print, in the image forming apparatus, printing target data received from a communication terminal device.
Network printing systems have been known heretofore which acquire, via the Internet from an image forming apparatus installed in a remote location, information accumulated in a printing service server on the Internet, enabling printing of the acquired document. A network printing system of such kind is known in which the user registers printing target data in advance by accessing the printing service server from a communication terminal device (e.g., mobile computing device) owned by the user, and then the user inputs a document ID (identification) to an image forming apparatus installed in, for example, a convenience store. This image forming apparatus accesses the printing service server via the Internet and acquires printing target data corresponding to the document ID from the printing service server, and prints the printing target data.
However, in the above-described conventional image forming system, the user needs to register into the printing service server in advance the printing target data that is to be printed in the image forming apparatus. Therefore, the above-described conventional image forming system needs a printing service server and requires the user to perform troublesome preparations for printing. In addition, since the image forming apparatus acquires the printing target data from the printing service server, after the document ID is input from the user, it is difficult to start the printing immediately after the input of the document ID. Nowadays, there is a demand for enabling the user to print the printing target data stored in a communication terminal device, such as a mobile device, of the user with a simpler operation using an image forming apparatus installed in public locations.